Killis Campbell, "Poe's Reading," University of Texas Studies in English, October 1925, pp. 166-96 More Info

Poe kept no diary or journal so far as we now know; and he left no biographical account of himself beyond the brief and very inaccurate memorandum that he sent to Griswold in 1841.Nevertheless, it is possible to glean from his writings a good deal about what he had read. His critical papers of various sorts are especially helpful in throwing light on his reading. Most of these were book reviews or book-notices, - there were more than four hundred in all, - and it is safe to assume that he read, and read pretty carefully, virtually every book that he reviewed. In his critical papers, moreover, are to be found numerous allusions and references to books and authors other than those that he reviewed. Both in his essays and in his poems and tales, furthermore, there are many direct quotations from books that he had read either in whole or in part, and there are likewise many echoes or reminiscences of passages that had caught his fancy. Some light has been thrown on the subject, too, by discoveries that have been made as to Poe's sources. And there is also external evidence, though this is scanty. For instance, a newspaper advertisement lists the books read in Poe's time in the Latin course that he took at the University of Virginia; there are bills and accounts in which certain of the books that he studied when a child in Richmond and London are mentioned by title; and there is some testimony proceeding from those who came into personal contact with him either in the schools that he attended or in his various activities in his maturer years.

The inferences that may be drawn from these several sorts of evidence are not, it must be admitted, as definite and as full as could be wished. It must be premised at the outset that Poe read a good many books that he does not refer to in his writings. It stands to reason, too, that his mere mentioning a book does not prove that he had read it, nor does quotation from a book prove that he had read it, - or, at least, that he had read it in its entirety. And it was inevitable that I should meet with quotations or allusions that I could not verify, and that I should overlook allusions here and there that others would have caught. More Info Nevertheless, the evidence at hand seems sufficient to warrant certain fairly satisfactory conclusions as to the content and the general trend of Poe's reading; and in some particulars it enables us to arrive at altogether positive and definitive results.

II

First of all, it may be said, and that quite confidently, that Poe's reading was mainly in the books and periodicals of his own time. He read, naturally, the newspapers of his day; and he devoured the magazines and annuals. He refers time and again in his critical papers to the magazines of the day, - to Blackwood's, to the Edinburgh Review, to the Westminster Review, to the North American Review, to Godey's, to Graham's, to the Democratic Review, to the Home Journal, to the Literary World, to the Saturday Evening Post. While editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, he published sundry brief notices of current issues of the leading magazines, and he continued this practice in the columns of the Evening Mirror and the Broadway Journal. His tales likewise attest his familiarity with the periodicals of his time; for aside from various allusions that occur in them, we now know that he drew from the newspapers and magazines the materials out of which he fashioned in some measure several of his stories.

Poe had also read widely in the poetry and in the fiction of his time. Among contemporary English poets he appears to have known best the work of Byron, Coleridge, Moore, and Tennyson.

Altogether, by my count, he refers to Byron thirty-three times. Besides, he quotes from Byron a total of fifteen times, drawing his quotations from "Childe Harold," "The Island," "The Bride of Abydos," "The Siege of Corinth," "Don Juan," and "Stanzas to Augusta," and he clearly echoes Byron in several of his early poems, including "Tamerlane," "Spirits of the Dead," "The City in the Sea," and the "The Coliseum," and he affects the Byronic manner in most of the poems of his first two volumes (1827 and 1829) and in one of his tales ("The Assignation"). From one or another of his references or from unmistakable reminiscences, it is plain that he had read, in addition to the half a dozen poems of Byron already mentioned, "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," "The Giaour," "Manfred," "The Corsair ," "The Dream," and a number of the briefer lyrics. There is, indeed, every likelihood that he had read all of Byron's poems, and that he had read and re-read many of them.

Coleridge he quotes from only five times, twice from the "Ancient Mariner" and three times from the Biographia Literaria. But his references to Coleridge are almost as numerous as his references to Byron: thirty in all, if we include his references to the prose writings. And the influence of Coleridge is palpable in the earlier "To Helen," in "The City in the Sea," in "The Sleeper," and is vaguely discernible also in the "Sonnet - To Science," "Fairy Land," and "The Raven." There are echoes also of the "Ancient Mariner," I think, in two of the tales, - "MS. Found in a Bottle" and "Arthur Gordon Pym." It is impossible to say how much of Coleridge he had read or had not read; but it is certain that he was familiar with the "Ancient Mariner," "Christabel," "Youth and Age," and "Genevieve," and he was well acquainted with the Biog-raphia Literaria, and likewise with the Table Talk, which he briefly noticed in one of his "Marginalia" published in 1844. He reviewed also in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1836 the Letters, Conversations and Recollections of Coleridge compiled by T. Allsop.

The poems of Thomas Moore I imagine he read more freely in his youth than in his later life. Certainly his indebtedness to Moore, which is unmistakable in "Al Aaraaf" and "Evening Star" and is discoverable also in "Fairy-Land," belongs to his earlier years, though he remained loyal to the Irish bard as long as he lived, pronouncing him in one of his later essays to be "the most skilful literary artist of his day - perhaps of any day"; and he reviewed Alciphron upon its appearance in 1839, praising it extravagantly. Aside from the excerpts cited in his review of Alciphron, he quotes directly from Moore only four times (in each instance from the Irish Melodies, though reminiscences of other poems are to be caught in his verses). The poems that he appears to have known best are Lalla Rookh (from which, as Professor Woodberry has noted, he culled whole lines and also sundry footnotes, for use, but slightly altered, in "Al Aaraaf"), the Irish Melodies (one of which, "While Gazing on the Moon's Light", evidently suggested the "Evening Star"), and Alciphron. He alludes to or echoes Moore, by my reckoning, a total of twenty-five times.

His more intimate acquaintance with Tennyson probably dates from some time in the thirties; indeed I find no reference to Tennyson in anything published before 1837. But after this date, and especially in the forties, his references to Tennyson are very frequent. I have noted twenty-seven references to Tennyson, and I find four quotations: "The Death of the Old Year" he quotes twice in its entirety, once he quotes from the song "Tears, Idle Tears," and once he cites a few lines from "Lilian." In addition to these he mentions by title "Locksley Hall," "Morte d'Arthur," Oenone," "Oriana," and "The Lady of Shalott."

With Wordsworth and Shelley he appears to have been less intimately acquainted, but all evidence points to the conclusion that he knew both of them well. He had doubtless read his Shelley through, and if not all of Wordsworth, then certainly he had read extensively in his poems. He quotes at one point or another from six of Shelley's Poems: "Queen Mab," "The Ode to the West Wind," "The Hymn to Intellectual Beauty," "Serenade," "Naples," and "To _____" ("Music when soft voices die"); and he refers to "Alastor" and several times to "The Sensitive Plant." Certain lines in "The City in the Sea" have been plausibly held to echo the "Lines Written among the Euganean Hills"; More Info and "Israfel" and "Sonnet - Silence" suggest the influence, respectively, of the ode "To a Skylark" and some of the songs in "Prometheus Unbound." More Info In other connections I have come across sixteen references to Shelley.

Poe professed to dislike Wordsworth, primarily because of the Lake poet's views on the aims and province of poetry. And C. F. Briggs wrote Lowell in 1845 that Poe did not read Wordsworth and knew "nothing about him." More Info But Briggs's statement was prejudiced, and is, to say the least, misleading. In his "Letter to B____" (1831) Poe quotes from "The Pet Lamb" and "The Idiot Boy", and from two of Wordsworth's prose pieces, the "Preface to the Lyrical Ballads" and "Essay Supplementary to the Preface"; and elsewhere he quotes from "The Excursion," "Guilt and Sorrow," and "She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways." And he apparently echoes Wordsworth in "The Valley of Unrest" and possibly also in "Romance" and "To _______" ("Not long ago," etc.) More Info He refers to Wordsworth or to his poems in fourteen other passages.

From Keats, however, for whom he expressed the highest admiration, Poe quotes nothing, so far as I have observed; and he refers to only one of his poems by name, "The Ode to the Nightingale." Twice he seems to echo Keats: in his "Sonnet - To Science," which apparently owes something to the famous passage on "philosophy" in "Lamia", and in "Al Aaraaf," which at one point (I, ll. 124-125) may have been influenced by "Endymion." But he mentions Keats only nine times.

Mrs. Browning's early poems he was familiar with, and especially her volume of 1844, The Drama of Exile, and Other Poems, which he reviewed in the Broadway Journal of January 4 and 11, 1845, and which he analyzed so minutely as to call forth her enthusiastic commendation. In this notice he quotes from upwards of half a dozen of Mrs. Browning's poems and refers to a dozen others. Elsewhere he quotes from Mrs. Browning only four times; but it is plain that he drew suggestions for several lines in "The Raven" from "Lady Geraldine's Courtship," and he may well have owed to Mrs. Browning the suggestion of the meter and the stanza form in "The Raven," as he almost surely owed to her the suggestion of his fantastic rhymes in that poem. His collected volume of poems published in 1845 he dedicated to Mrs. Browning, possibly in tacit acknowledgment of his debt to her.

To Robert Browning, on the other hand, he was not attracted, the only mention of him that he makes being a second-hand reference in which he asserts that Mrs. Browning had reported that the "great poet Mr. Browning" had expressed approval of "The Raven." Southey, also, appears to have interested him little, for although he reviewed both his Naval History and The Doctor, he quotes from his poems only once and refers to them only twice. Scott he was deeply interested in, but primarily on account of his novels. He quotes from Scott's poems only twice, very briefly in each instance, and he refers to his poems less than half a dozen times. Burns he believed to have been overrated. He quotes from him twice, and alludes to him or to his poems only five times. Chatterton he mentions once; but he nowhere mentions Blake. Hood, whom he warmly admired, he mentions at least eight times, and he reviewed his Prose and Verse (1845) at length, quoting in the course of his comments several of his poems and referring by title to several others. Campbell he quotes only once, but he refers to him thirteen times. Rogers he quotes from not at all, so far as I have observed, but refers to twice. Cowper he quotes three times, and refers to six times. Crabbe he refers to three times. The poems of "Ossian" he reviewed briefly in Burton's in 1839, and he quotes from them once and refers to them twice. Hogg he mentions several times, but always by way of disparagement. For Montgomery also he had no word of praise, though he mentions him five times. Macaulay he mentions some twelve times, but always with reference to his work as a critic. Mrs. Hemans he mentions six times, but nowhere quotes, so far as I have observed. Miss Landon ("L. E. L.") he quotes three times, but refers to only twice. Tupper, who had developed an artificial vogue at the end of the forties, he mentions three times. Boucicault he mentions twice.

Of the earlier English poets he knew best Milton and Shakespeare. I suspect that he knew his Milton better than his Shakespeare, - at least, that he knew Paradise Lost and Comus better than he knew any play of Shakespeare, with the possible exception of Hamlet, though the statistics that I have gathered may seem to contradict this opinion. Altogether, by my count, he quotes from Milton thirty times and from Shakespeare forty-eight times; and he refers to or echoes Milton only thirty-eight times, whereas he refers to Shakespeare or echoes some passage from him forty-nine times, by my reckoning. In view of the greater volume of Shakespeare's works, this disparity in figures may not, I think, be held to invalidate my belief as to his more intimate acquaintance with Milton. Besides, a good many of his quotations from Shakespeare are very brief, such as "trumpet-tongued," "wise saws," "counterfeit presentment," "flat burglary," "out-Herod Herod," "stale, flat, and unprofitable" - phrases that have become a part of our common speech and that he may accordingly have caught from his general reading.

The poems of Milton from which Poe quotes are Paradise Lost (fifteen times), Comus (seven times), Lycidas (once), "On the Death of a Fair Infant Dying of a Cough" (once), his "Epitaph on the Marchioness of Winchester" (twice), his epitaph "On Shakespeare" (once), and his Latin poem "De Idea Platonica," etc. (once), and there are numerous echoes of Paradise Lost in "Al Aaraaf." Evidently he knew best Paradise Lost and Comus. He was not unacquainted, moreover, with Milton's prose. He reviewed in 1845 Griswold's edition of Milton's Prose Works, and he refers in his notes on "Al Aaraaf" to Sumner's edition of the Christian Doctrine, and he quotes twice, briefly, from his "Reason of Church Government."

The quotations from Shakespeare that I have been able to identify are from the following plays: Hamlet (twenty-four), Macbeth (five), Midsummer Night's Dream (three), Julius Caesar (two), Othello (two), As You Like It (two), Henry IV, Part I (two), Twelfth Night (two), Merry Wives of Windsor (one), The Merchant of Venice (one), Measure for Measure (one), King John (one), Much Ado About Nothing (one), and Richard II (one). But there are reminiscences of Antony and Cleopatra, The Tempest, and King Lear, and there are comments on characters or situations in King Lear, Romeo and Juliet, A Winter's Tale, and The Taming of the Shrew which make it virtually certain that he was familiar also with each of these plays.

After Milton and Shakespeare, among the earlier English poets the poet best known to him was Pope. He quotes from Pope seventeen times, and refers to him some twenty-two times. It is reasonably plain that he knew "The Dunciad," "The Rape of the Lock," the "Essay on Criticism," "Eloisa to Abelard," and the "Epistle to Arbuthnot." More Info Dryden, on the other hand, although he quotes from him six times, he refers to only four times. The quotations that he makes are drawn from "Absalom and Achtophel," All for Love," and his translation of Virgil's "Georgics." He quotes from Gray five times, and refers to him four times. Collins he refers to twice. Goldsmith's poems he quotes from three times, but appears to have been chiefly interested in his Vicar of Wakefield. Young he quotes twice, and refers to four times. Tickell he quotes twice and refers to once. Thomson he quotes once (very briefly) and mentions once (mis-spelling his name). Sheridan he quotes once and mentions five times. Farquhar he quotes once, and Nathaniel Lee once, and he refers once to Cibber. Of the so-called metaphysical poets of the seventeenth century he quotes nowhere, so far as I have observed, from Herrick or Suckling or Waller or Denham or Davenant. But he refers once to Carew, once to Wither, and three times to Donne, and he quotes once each from Wither and from Marvell, and three times from Cowley, whom he also refers to five times. Clearly he had read Butler's Hudibras, however, as is attested by six quotations from that work and eleven references to it.

Of the Elizabethan dramatists other than Shakespeare, he had, it appears, read little. He quotes twice from Marlowe's Doctor Faustus, and once from Edward II, and twice from Webster's Duchess of Malfi; and he quotes three times from Peele (to whom he elsewhere refers once); he quotes also once from Ferrex and Porrex, once from Marston, and once from Chapman; he clearly echoes Beaumont and Fletcher in Politian, and he refers once to Rochester, once to Massinger, once to Dekker, and once to Ford.

Spenser he quotes twice (in each instance from the Faerie Queene), and refers to five times. Sidney he quotes three times and refers to five times. Wyatt he quotes once, Raleigh once, Giles Fletcher once, Bishop Hall once, and William Browne once. He quotes also from one of Ben Jonson's lyrics. Chaucer he nowhere quotes, but refers to once. I imagine that Chaucer and the Middle English verse writers were scarcely more than names to him.

Of the American poets, it seems fairly certain that he knew best Bryant and Longfellow and Willis.

He reviewed at length the fourth (1836) edition of Bryant's poems in the Southern Literary Messenger for January, 1837, quoting in the course of his review from some thirty-five of Bryant's poems. He also published a notice of Bryant in Burton's Magazine for May, 1840, and a longer article in Godey's for April, 1846. Elsewhere he quotes from "Thanatopsis" and from "June," and he refers to Bryant in other connections eighteen times. Once he quotes a prose comment of Bryant's on Halleck's poems, and once he refers to his anthology of American poetry.

And he was no less familiar with Longfellow. He wrote extended reviews of the Voices of the Night and Ballads and Other Poems, the first of these being published in Burton's Magazine in 1840, the other - one of the most memorable of his reviews - in Graham's in 1842. He also published a brief notice of Hyperion in 1839. He engaged in the unhappy controversy over Longfellow's originality in the so-called "Longfellow War" in 1845. In the same year he published an extended analysis and appreciation of The Spanish Student, and also a brief estimate of Longfellow's Waif; and four years later, in his essay, "The Rationale of Verse", he waxed merry over the style and metre of Evangeline. In the course of these several articles he quotes from a dozen or more of Longfellow's early poems; and he refers to Longfellow in other connections some thirty-five times.

As to Willis's inferiority as poet to Longfellow and Bryant, Poe labored under no delusion. But he was attracted to Willis on personal grounds, and he took occasion to write about him often, partly because of his friendship and partly because he felt that he had not been dealt with justly by his critics. He reviewed his Tortesa in July, 1839, in the Pittsburg Literary Examiner, and again, the following month, in Burton's Magazine, and still later and more fully in the American Whig Review. In January, 1845, he published in the Broadway Journal an essay on Willis, and he also touched on him in his "Literati" and "Autography."

Incidentally it may be noted that he also reviewed Willis's prose writings, - his Inklings of Adventure in 1836, his Romance of Travel in 1840, and his Dashes at Life with a Free Pencil in 1845. Elsewhere he quotes from Willis only twice, so far as I have noted, but he refers to him some eighteen times.

Of Lowell, whom he considered a rival of Longfellow and Bryant for the primacy among American poets Poe wrote comparatively little; but it will be recalled that Lowell was ten years younger than Poe and that he had been before the public less than ten years when the latter died. Poe was, in reality, by no means slow in discovering Lowell. As early as December, 1841, in one of his papers on autography, he declared that Lowell was "entitled . . . to at least the second or third place among the poets of America"; and in a review in Graham's in March, 1844, he praised enthusiastically his Poems of that year. Five years later he contributed to the Southern Literary Messenger a lengthy review of the Fable for Critics. He also reviewed informally Lowell's Conversations on the Old Poets in the Evening Mirror of January 11, 1845.

With the poems of Emerson and Holmes and Whittier Poe seems to have had no very close acquaintance; and Whitman, whom he knew personally, had not as yet emerged from obscurity. The subjects with which Whittier dealt he frankly asserts in his "Autography", he had little taste for ("are never to my liking") ; and although he praises, in two of his later notices, Holmes's "Last Leaf," he betrays no familiarity with his poems. Emerson and his associated Transcendentalists rubbed Poe the wrong way, and he let slip no opportunity to express his disapproval of them. He describes Emerson in one of his stories as "hyperquizzistical"; in his "exordium" as editor of Graham's he pronounces "Emersonism" to be "confusion worse confounded"; and in his "Autography" he speaks of Emerson's "twaddle." Only once, so far as I have noted, has he any word of praise for Emerson, and then at the expense of Carlyle. More Info

On the other hand, as professional reviewer he had occasion to pass judgment on a score or more of the lesser American poets of his day, including Mrs. Osgood, Joseph Rodman Drake, Fitz-Greene Halleck, Mrs. Sigourney, Mrs. Ellett, George P. Morris, William Ellery Channing, Charles Fenno Hoffman, Sprague, Brainard, Dawes, Mrs. Welby, Park Benjamin, William W. Lord, Henry B. Hirst, Lambert A. Wilmer, Thomas Holley Chivers, Mrs. Elizabeth Oakes-Smith, Mrs. Hewitt, and Mrs. Lewis. Some of these, as Mrs. Osgood, Mrs. Sigourney, Drake, Halleck, Channing, Dawes, and Brainard, he reviewed at length; and some (as Mrs. Osgood and Mrs. Lewis) he reviewed several times. Other American poets that came in for more or less frequent mention in his critical papers are Pinkney, Mrs. Brooks, Alice and Phoebe Cary, H. T. Tuckerman, Thomas Buchanan Read, Mrs. Hewitt, Albert Pike, and Philip Pendleton Cooke.

Of the earlier American poets he was apparently acquainted with Freneau (whom he quotes once, and refers to four times); Trumbull, whom he refers to seven times; and Barlow, whose Columbiad he refers to twice. But I find no evidence that he knew the work of Anne Bradstreet (casually referred to once) or of Timothy Dwight or of any of the early American dramatists.

III

Of the English and American novelists and tale-writers he was familiar at least with Dickens, Bulwer, Scott, Disraeli, Ainsworth, G. P. R. James, Cooper, Irving, Hawthorne, and Simms.

Of these he probably knew Dickens best. He had read Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, Pickwick Papers, Watkins Tottle and Other Sketches, Master Humphry's Clock (including Old Curiosity Shop), and Barnaby Rudge, for he wrote critical notices of each of them. Outside of these critical notices he refers to Dickens some twenty times. And he praised no other English novelist so ungrudgingly as he did Dickens. The two met, as his biographers have duly pointed out, in the spring of 1842, and a brief correspondence ensued.

After Dickens he was probably better acquainted with Bulwer than with any other writer of fiction. He published reviews of Rienzi and Night and Morning, and of his Poems and Critical and Miscellaneous Writings; he was also familiar with Pelham, Ernest Maltravers, and The Last Days of Pompeii, as sundry comments on these novels make clear; and he refers once or oftener to Eugene Aram, The Last of the Barons, Devereux, and Godolphin, and to the plays Richelieu, Money, The Lady of Lyons, and The Duchesse de la Valliere. Professor Woodberry has suggested, quite plausibly, that his tales "Lionizing" and "Shadow. A Parable" reflect the influence, respectively, of "Conversations with an Ambitious Student in III Health" and "Monos and Daimonos." More Info Three times he quotes from Bulwer; and he comments several times on Bulwer's skill in plot-construction and on the defects of his style. Twice, in 1845 and in 1848, he discusses Bulwer's gifts as playwright.

With Scott's novels he was evidently less familiar, though (as I have already said) he was more attracted to his novels than to his poetry. From references and comments in one or another of his critical papers, we may reasonably infer that he had read Waverley, Ivanhoe, Rob Roy, The Pirate, The Bride of Lammermoor, and Anne of Geierstein; and allusions less specific in nature make it probable that he had also read Kenilworth, Guy Mannering, and The Antiquary. He alludes to Scott or to his writings some twenty-two times.

He appears to have been fairly well acquainted with the novels of William Harrison Ainsworth, Benjamin Disraeli, and G. P. R. James. He reviewed Ainsworth's Guy Fawkes and Tower of London, and evidently knew also his Jack Sheppard and Crichton. More Info He reviewed James's Corse de Leon, his Richard Coeur de Lion, his Celebrated Women, and his Lives of Richelieu, and he had probably read also his De L'Orme. So far as I know, he reviewed nothing of Disraeli's, but he borrowed materials from Vivian Grey for his "King Pest" and possibly also for his "Masque of the Red Death." He refers to Vivian Grey once, and once also to Contarina Fleming.

Thackeray, it seems, was a sealed book to Poe; and so, too, apparently was Jane Austen. He had but a limited acquaintance also, it appears, with Charlotte Bronte, with Anne Radcliffe, with Frances Burney, each of whom he alludes to once; and with Maria Edgeworth, whom he refers to four times. But he seems to have read several of Godwin's works (he speaks familiarly of Caleb Williams, and he reviewed his Lives of the Necromancers); and he had evidently read Beckford's Vathek; and apparently he had read The Castle of Otranto. He wrote brief reviews of new editions of Robinson Crusoe and The Vicar of Wakefield, and he refers to Defoe elsewhere eleven times. Evidently, too, he had read Pilgrim's Progress, and Rasselas, and Gulliver's Travels, each of which he refers to familiarly once or oftener. To Fielding he refers five times, and to Richardson four times; he quotes from Smollett once and refers to him six times; and he quotes from Sterne twice and refers to him seven times. He reviewed Lever's Charles O'Malley and also Marryat's Joseph Rushbrook and his Diary in America. He refers three times to Maturin, once to Monk Lewis, once to Jane Porter, once to Pierce Egan, and twice to Theodore Hook. He reviewed enthusiastically Warren's Ten Thousand a Year, and he also knew his Tales of a Physician. Once he quotes from Sidney's Arcadia, and three times he refers (vaguely) to Euphues.

Among American writers of fiction he was probably most at home with Cooper and Irving and Hawthorne and Simms. He published reviews of Cooper's Wyandotte, Mercedes of Castile, and Sketches of Switzerland, and of his History of the Navy of the United States. He wrote N. C. Brooks in 1838 that he had read nothing of Irving's since he "was a boy, save his 'Granada,'" but ignored in this statement the fact that he had published brief notices of the Crayon Miscellany in the Southern Literary Messenger for July and December, 1835, and a lengthy review and analysis of Astoria in the Messenger for January, 1837. Subsequently (in 1841) he reviewed Irving's edition of The Life and Writings of Margaret Miller Davidson. Furthermore, he frequently refers to Irving: I have noted twenty-one references to him outside of the reviews that I have mentioned. Evidently he knew the Sketch Book and the Tales of a Traveler. In Graham's for April and May, 1842, appeared his memorable notice of Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales, in which he displays a minute acquaintance with Hawthorne's writings published up to that time; and he later reviewed, in Godey's for November, 1847, both the Twice-Told Tales and Mosses from an Old Manse. Doubtless he read everything of Hawthorne's as soon as it came from the press. He reviewed four of Simms's novels: The Partisan, The Damsel of Darien, The Wigwam and the Cabin, and Beauchampe; and references to "Murder Will Out" make it appear that he was also familiar with that story. Elsewhere he refers to Simms ten or a dozen times. He doubtless read also everything that his friend John Pendleton Kennedy published. He reviewed Horseshoe Robinson in an early number of the Southern Literary Messenger, displaying at the same time familiarity with his Swallow Barn. He also reviewed four of the novels of another friend, Robert Montgomery Bird, - namely, his Calavar, The Infidel, The Hawks of Hawk-Hollow, and Sheppard Lee. He was well acquainted with some of the tales of Willis and of John Neal, and he had read, - mainly for purposes of review, in all likelihood, - Beverley Tucker's George Balcombe, Fay's Norman Leslie, French's Elkswatawa, Thomas's Clinton Bradshaw, Ingraham's Lafitte and The Southwest, Stone's Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman, and Miss Sedgwick's Linwoods and her Tales and Sketches, all of which he reviewed at one time or another. How much of Charles Brockden Brown he had read is not clear. He refers to him four times, but mentions none of his works by title. More Info

IV

Of the English essayists it appears that he knew best Addison, Carlyle, Johnson, Macaulay, Lamb, Hazlitt, and Christopher North. Of these, it is interesting to observe, he refers oftenest to Carlyle, mentioning the sage of Chelsea some twenty times, but nowhere uttering any word of praise of him. In an early story he remarks that the "best pigeon-winger over all kinds of style" is his "friend Mr. Carlyle." In one of his reviews, after applying to Carlyle an opprobious epithet, he declares that he takes "all possible pains to prevent us from understanding" what he has to say. And in a late number of the "Marginalia" he predicted that Carlyle would be forgotten in "ten years - possibly in five." Evidently he had read Sartor Resartus, and apparently, also, some or all of the Heroes and Hero-Worship.

Numerous references (ten or more in all) make it plain that he had read Addison's essays in the Spectator; and he had probably read Addison's Cato, which he mentions in one of his stories and which he seems to have echoed in his Politian. Twice he quotes from Addison, and twice he refers to the "Vision of Mirza."

Samuel Johnson he mentions eleven times and quotes twice. He had read, it appears, his Lives of the Poets (at least in part) ; and he had also read Rasselas. Apparently, too, he had read Boswell's Johnson. More Info

Macaulay, whom he thought very highly of, he quotes once and mentions in other connections thirteen times. As a critic and reviewer, Poe possessed not a little in common with Macaulay, and naturally he admired his erudition, his power of analysis, and his directness and terseness. More Info He reviewed for Graham's in 1841 Macaulay's Critical and Miscellaneous Essays; but the only two of the essays that he definitely refers to are those on "Bacon" and "Ranke's History of the Popes." In "A Tale of the Ragged Mountains" he appropriated several paragraphs from the essay on "Warren Hastings." More Info

Among other English essayists, he mentions Gifford once, Brougham twice, Burke twice, Jeffrey twice, Hazlitt three times, Leigh Hunt four times, Swift four times, Kit North five times, and Charles Lamb seven times; and it is clear that he was more or less familiar with each of these. He reviewed Hunt's Indicator and Companion, Hazlitt's Characters of Shakespeare More Info and his Literary Remains, Brougham's Miscellaneous Writings and his Sketches of Public Characters, Kit North's Genius of Burns and his Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, and Lamb's Specimens of English and Dramatic Poetry. Burke he praises, and so also Kit North in an early reference, though in his later critical writings he has little to say of him by way of praise. Of Lamb's Specimens of English Dramatic Poets he remarks that it had been "the dear companion of many joyful years."

He mentions De Quincey, so far as I have observed, only once, though certain unmistakable similarities in style between the two (see in particular Poe's tales "Shadow" and "Silence") would tend to show that he had read De Quincey at some time pretty closely. The Confessions of an English Opium-Eater he evidently knew, and it may very well be that he had read De Quincey's Klosterheim, which exhibits more than one point of similarity with "The Masque of the Red Death."

How much of Bacon he had read I cannot feel certain. Twice he refers to a passage in the Novum Organum; and he was fond of quoting Bacon's aphorism, "There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in its proportions," from his essay "Of Beauty." And he notes that Bacon admitted a cryptograph into his De Augmentis.

Steele he does not mention at all; and there is no evidence that he had read Dryden's essays. Jeremy Taylor he mentions once, and Sir Thomas Browne he mentions three times and quotes twice (from the Urn Burial). Glanvill he quotes three times. And it has already been noted that he had read the critical essays and prefaces of Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Bulwer, and also something of the prose writings of John Milton.

Of the American essayists he mentions oftenest Emerson, but, as in the case of Carlyle, almost invariably to utter some disparaging comment. He harps on Emerson's imitation of Carlyle, and on his vagueness; and he abuses him as the chief spokesman for the Transcendentalists. Only once, as I have already noted, has he a good word for Emerson, when he speaks in his "Marginalia" of his "true talent" and "real force."

He has but little praise also for Margaret Fuller, whom he had read in the Dial and the New York Tribune and in her Woman in the Nineteenth Century. Alcott, whom he had read in the Dial, he mentions only to sneer at, dubbing him in one of his papers as the "Orphicist."

Channing he mentions five times, always referring to him in respectful terms, and praising him unstintedly in one of his papers on "Autography." And he refers in one of his latest papers to E. P. Whipple and W. A. Jones in highly complimentary terms, pronouncing them to be our "most analytic if not altogether our best" critics in America of his day. Everett he mentions five times, and he doubtless knew well his work as editor and critic, though he was always at loggerheads with the North American Review. Palfrey he refers to once, Franklin once, and Jefferson six times. Ripley he nowhere mentions, and so, also, with Thoreau.

Of the English and American historians Poe had, I suspect, read little. He refers to Gibbon three times, to Hume once, to Bancroft once, and to Prescott once. Nowhere in his writings have I met with any reference to Clarendon or to Robertson or to Grote or to Mitford or Hallam or Turner. As a boy he probably had the school drill in Greek and Roman history and in English history. In one of the bills for tuition at the school of the Misses Dubourg in London a charge of nine-pence is entered for instruction in the "Catechism of Hist. of England." But his maturer reading in history proper appears to have been confined largely to foreign historians.

He had read, however, sundry books of travel and exploration, a type of narrative which he was very fond of and which furnished him with considerable material for his short stories. He reviewed for the Southern Literary Messenger Lynch's South Sea Expedition and J. N. Reynolds's South Sea Expedition; and in an uncollected paper in Graham's for 1843 he published a notice of a pamphlet dealing with the subsequent exploring expedition of Reynolds. Other works of a similar nature that he reviewed were Stephens's Incidents of Travel in Central America, Murray's Travels in North America, and Schoolcraft's Algic Researches; and it is plain from the use that he made of them in his Journal of Julius Rodman that he had read Benjamin Morrell's Narrative of Four Voyages to the South Seas and an account of the Lewis and Clark expedition into the Northwest. He had read also several works dealing with social life in America, including Frances Anne Kemble's Journal (which he reviewed), and Mrs. Trollope's Domestic Manners of the Americans.

He had dipped into philosophy, but his reading in this direction, at least so far as the English philosophers were concerned, must have been both limited and haphazard. Mill he had some acquaintance with: he quotes from him twice, and mentions him three times in other connections. And Bentham, whom he disapproved of heartily, he refers to some ten times. In common with Emerson and Whitman, he had little sympathy with Utilitarianism. Locke he refers to four times, to Hume once, and he reviewed in 1841 a collected edition of Bolingbroke's writings. But he nowhere refers to Berkeley, so far as I have observed. Among philosophical-religious treatises he evidently followed very closely the publication of the "Bridgewater Treatises," which he comments on several times, and he was acquainted with the Christian Philosopher of Thomas Dick, as Miss Alterton has recently shown. And he quotes once from Tom Paine, and once refers to him, characterizing him as "a very clever, very ignorant, and laughably impudent fellow."

Of the English scientists, likewise, his knowledge must have been limited. He quotes Newton three times, and refers to him sixteen times (mainly in his Eureka). Sir John Herschel he refers to seven times. And he refers half a dozen times or oftener to David Brewster, whose Letters on Natural Magic he relied on for information wrought into his "Adventures of Hans Pfaall." His Conchologist's First Book unhappily bears too convincing testimony that he was familiar with Captain Thomas Brown's Conchologist's Text-Book. More Info And in his Eureka and in his notes on "Hans Pfaall" he mentions various other works of a scientific nature proceeding from English authors, including Nichol's The Architecture of the Heavens and several current scientific magazines.

V

The extent of Poe's reading in foreign literatures is less easy to determine. How well he had control of certain of the foreign languages is still a matter of debate. It is certain, however, that he could read French with ease; and he probably had such reading knowledge of Latin as an exceptionally gifted product of the better preparatory schools of today would possess. And he could make some headway with German, Spanish, and Italian in the original, and also with Greek.

Plainly he had read a good many French works in the original. Of the French poets and dramatists he refers oftenest to Béranger, whom he quotes three times and mentions in one connection or another some ten times. Lamartine he refers to nine times. Corneille he quotes once and alludes to twice; Moliére he quotes once and refers to once; and Racine also he quotes once and refers to once. Crébillon he quotes three times and refers to three times. Quinault he quotes once. Chamfort he quotes four times and refers to twice.

Of the French novelists and essayists and historians he quotes Balzac twice and refers to him twice, alluding to him once as "that flippant Frenchman." Hugo he quotes once and refers to twice, alluding to him once as "that absurd antithesis-hunter." Dumas he refers to twice. Le Sage he refers to seven times; clearly he had read Gil Blas. He had also read Eugene Sue's The Mysteries of Paris, and probably also The Wandering Jew. Rabelais he quotes twice and mentions six times. Rousseau he quotes twice (from the Nouvelle Héloise in each instance) and mentions four times. Voltaire he quotes five times. Zadig he had read; and his Histoire Particuliére was one of five books which the records show he drew out of the library of the University of Virginia. Two other volumes drawn out of the University of Virginia library were Rollin's Histoire Romaine and Histoire Ancienne. Chateaubriand he quotes once and refers to six times. St. Pierre he quotes once and refers to five times. Boileau he refers to twice. Montaigne he quotes once and refers to only once. La Bruyère he quotes twice and refers to once. La Rochefoucauld he quotes once and refers to four times.

Of French philosophers and scientists he refers to Comte only once; he quotes Condorcet once and refers to him once; Pascal he quotes once and refers to twice. To Helvetius he refers three times, and to Fourier five times. Victor Cousin he mentions once. La Place he mentions frequently (seven times) in his Eureka, and he evidently drew suggestions from him for that work. And he was also familiar with Cuvier, from whom he translated in part his book on conchology. Other French writers whom he either quotes or refers to at least once are La Fontaine, Buffon, Gresset, "George Sand", Marmontel, De Blainville, Tournefort, and Champollion.

Of German writers, he alludes oftenest to A. W. Schlegel, whose Lectures on Dramatic Art he had read. He quotes from Schlegel once, and alludes to him a total of fourteen times. Goethe comes in for next most frequent mention. He is quoted three times, - once from "Meine Göttin" and twice from "Das Veilchen." Possibly Poe had read the Sorrows of Werther and possibly his Torquato Tasso. Schiller he quotes once and mentions twice. Lessing figures not at all in Poe's writings. Bürger, however, is referred to three times, Herder and Körner each twice, and Uhland and Wieland each once. Fouqué, whose Undine Poe reviewed at length in Burton's in 1839, is referred to seven times; Novalis is quoted three times (once for six lines in the original, which Poe then translates); and Tieck is quoted once and referred to three times. Hoffman, to whom it has been held Poe was indebted for material for several of his stories, is not mentioned.

Of the German philosophers Kant is mentioned seven times, Schelling five times, Fichte twice, and Hegel once. Hegel is also quoted once. Schelling's idea of identity lies at the base of his story "Morella." Clearly enough Poe shared with the Transcendentalists an interest in German philosophy.

He was also interested in the activities of German scientists and historians. Humboldt, to whom he dedicated his Eureka, he refers to three times, and quotes once. Kepler he mentions ten times, pronouncing him in one passage to be immortal. Hevelius he refers to twice. Leibnitz he quotes once and refers to seven times. Niebuhr, in a review of his Roman History, he praises above all other historians of Rome. On the other hand, Von Raumer, whose work on America and the American People he briefly reviewed in the Broadway Journal, he condemns vigorously.

Of Spanish writers he seems to have known best Cervantes, whose Don Quixote he had surely read. but probably in Smollett's translation. He quotes twice an epigram which he attributes to Cervantes, translating it in one instance, and he refers to Cervantes in thirteen other passages. Calderon he quotes once, and refers to once. Quevedo's sonnet "Rome in Ruins" he quotes in one of his reviews and possibly echoes in his "Coliseum." Lope de Vega he mentions twice, and he quotes from Luis Ponce de Leon (garbling his text, however) in a note on "Al Aaraaf."

Dante he quotes twice and refers to eleven times, several of his references indicating that he had read the Divine Comedy. Boccaccio he mentions only twice, but apparently he had read the Decameron. Ariosto he mentions three times. He reviewed Campbell's Life of Petrarch, but elsewhere he refers to Petrarch only once. Politian he quotes once. Tasso was among the poets studied in his course in Italian at the University of Virginia. More Info Politian he quotes once, echoes at least once, and alludes to, of course, in his play of that title. Machiavelli he refers to nine times. Other Italian writers whom he refers to at least once are Boccalini, the Abbate Gravina, Manzoni, and Castiglione.

Among Latin writers, Seneca, Virgil, and Horace receive most frequent mention. Seneca is quoted twice and is alluded to twelve times. I have been able to identify eleven quotations from Virgil and a dozen from Horace; and Virgil is alluded to eight times and Horace four times. Cicero is quoted once, and is referred to eight times. Pliny is quoted once and referred to three times. Juvenal and Longinus are each quoted once. Quintilian and Ovid are each quoted twice. Sallust is quoted once and alluded to twice. Terence is alluded to twice and Tacitus six times. Tertullian is quoted twice and referred to three times. Lucretius is quoted once and referred to twice. Catullus is referred to twice, and is cited twice as the author of the phrase "Vox et praeterea nihil," but, as Dr. T. O. Mabbott has pointed out (Poe's Politian, p. 68) these words belong to Plutarch, not to Catullus.

How many of the Latin authors that he refers to he had actually read at any length, it is impossible to say. While at the University in 1826 he read (if a list of the reading done by the senior class for the year 1829 indicates also the reading done in 1826) something of Horace, and possibly also Cicero's epistles, Virgil's Georgics, the Annals of Tacitus, and something of Plautus, of Terence, and of Juvenal. While a student at Clarke's and Burke's school in Richmond in 1820-5 he is said to have been very apt at "capping" verses from the Latin authors, and to have been especially fond of Horace's Odes. One of the bills submitted to John Allan by Poe's Richmond teacher, Joseph R. Clarke, contains charges for copies of Horace and of Cicero's De Officiis. He reviewed for the Southern Literary Messenger in May, 1836, Anthon's Sallust; and at some time he also reviewed Brooks's edition of Ovid.

Among Greek writers he quotes twice from Homer, - once from the Iliad, once from the Odyssey (in both instances in translation), - and he refers to Homer some twenty-six times. In a passage in Politian he quotes (in English) three lines from the Odyssey which I can find in none of the translations accessible to me, and which Poe may have translated from the original. He had in all likelihood read the Iliad, and probably also the Odyssey, though both, I suspect, mainly in translation.

He had some acquaintance with the Greek drama, though again doubtless in translation for the most part. Aeschylus he refers to thirteen times, and speaks of familiarly. Euripides he quotes once (in the original, giving the line numbers) and refers to six times. Sophocles he quotes once (from the Antigone), but in translation, and refers to seven times. Aristotle he quotes four times, three times in the original, once in translation, and he refers to him nine times. Plato, too, he appears to have read in some measure. He quotes once from the Symposium (in the original), and once at length from the Republic (in translation), and he reviewed an edition of one of Plato's dialogues. Elsewhere he refers to him six times.

Demosthenes he quotes once and mentions six times. Lucian he quotes three times. Pindar he refers to six times, Herodotus once. Josephus he quotes once. The story of Sappho he plays upon in "Al Aaraaf." Anaxagoras he refers to once, and Archilochus four times. Dyonysius of Halicarnassus he credits with having suggested to him the title "Pinakidia." Simonides he quotes once. Anacreon he refers to three times, Theophrastus twice, and Plutarch six times.

Of Oriental works it is plain, from various allusions, that he had read the Arabian Nights, and he had also read something of the Koran, using Sale's translation and his "Preliminary Discourse." He mentions Hafiz twice, but probably had no first-hand acquaintance with him; and he refers once to Saadi's Gulistan.

VI

Poe's acquaintance with the Scriptures can hardly have been intimate, but it is evident that he had read his Bible, and some parts of it fairly closely. He quotes from the Bible, by my count, forty-five times; and he echoes passages from the Bible or alludes to persons or places or incidents mentioned in it seventy-four times. Thirty-one of his direct quotations are from the Old Testament and fourteen from the New Testament; and fifteen of the twenty-two Scriptural passages that he echoes are from the Old Testament. Most of his allusions, too, are to characters or places or happenings spoken of in the Old Testament. The books that he appears to have known best are Psalms, Isaiah, and Ezekiel in the Old Testament, and the Gospels of Matthew and John in the New Testament. He refers once to the Apocryphal book of Judith.

The Prayer Book of the Episcopal Church he may be assumed to have been more or less familiar with, since in his boyhood he attended the Episcopal Church with his foster-mother. And there is among the "Ellis-Allan Papers" in the Library of Congress a bill for instruction in the Catechism while at the Misses Dubourg's school in London ("Church Catechism explained . . . 0 - 0 - 9 ") , paid by John Allan July 6, 1816. Once, indeed, he quotes from the Episcopal Cathechism, and at least twice he quotes from the Prayer Book.

In the bill that I have just mentioned there is also a charge for two school books, presumably used by Poe while with the Misses Dubourg: Mavor's Spelling Book and Fresnoy's Geography. Professor Woodberry notes (on the authority of Col. Thomas H. Ellis) that Allan obtained for Poe's use just before sailing to Europe in 1815 "an Olive Branch," a "Murray's Reader," and two Murray's Spelling Books." And a copy of Aesop's Fables which he owned is still preserved in Richmond. More Info I have already pointed out that copies of Horace and Cicero were among the items in one of the bills for tuition at the school of J. H. Clarke in Richmond.

Among the books of a miscellaneous nature that we know him to have read are several works on good breeding, including Mrs. Sigourney's Letters to Young Ladies and two other treatises of like nature, Canons of Good Breeding and Advice to a Young Gentleman on Entering Society, each of which he reviewed; a compilation of law cases, Bland's Chancery Reports; a medical treatise, Haxall's Diseases of the Abdomen, and an issue of a medical journal, the British and Foreign Medical Review (both of which he wrote notices of for the Southern Literary Messenger); two works dealing with the history of religion in America, Hawks's Contributions to the Ecclesiastical History of the United States of America and Cotton's Thoughts on the Religious State of the Country; Paulding's Slavery in the United States and his Life of Washington; even certain gazetteers and almanacs, including Martin's New and Compendious Gazetteer of Virginia and the American Almanac for 1836 and for 1837.

And that he consulted from time to time encyclopedias, dictionaries, anthologies, and other works of reference goes without saying. He quotes once from the Encyclopedia Britannica; he refers at least once to Johnson's dictionary; he refers several times to the dictionaries of Webster and Worcester, and he reviewed an edition of Worcester's Dictionary. He was fond of quoting from Bielfeld's Les Premiers Traits de l'Erudition Universelle; and he drew on D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature for several items utilized in his "Pinakidia," "Marginalia," and elsewhere. Griswold's Poets and Poetry of America he reviewed at least twice, and referred to often; and he also reviewed his Female Poets of America, and was likewise familiar with the anthologies of Cheever and Keese and Kettell. Of anthologies of English poetry he reviewed Hall's Book of Gems and his Old English Poetry, and he refers to Headley's Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry, from which he draws at least one quotation. He wrote a vitriolic review of Pue's Latin Grammar, and he published a notice of Anthon's edition of Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities. He refers several times to Bryant's Mythology. Once he quotes from Goold Brown's English Grammar, and he refers also to Cobbett's English Grammar and several times to Lindley Murray.

VII

The foregoing statement of particulars seems to warrant the following conclusions:

1. That Poe's reading was extensive, but uneven; that is, that he had read widely, but that much of his reading was either desultory or superficial.

2. That his most intensive reading was done in the writings of his own time.

3. That he was pretty thoroughly acquainted with the work of Byron, Coleridge, Moore, Tennyson, Mrs. Browning, Milton, Shakespeare, Dickens, Bulwer, Disraeli, and Ainsworth among English writers, and with the work of Longfellow, Bryant, and Willis among American writers.

4. That he had small acquaintance (if any) with the writings of Jane Austen, Thackeray, and Robert Browning, and that he had not read extensively in the writings of Fielding and Richardson, of Dryden and his contemporaries (save Samuel Butler), and of the contemporaries of Milton and Shakespeare.

5. That his knowledge of the English essayists was limited, his closest acquaintance being with Coleridge and Macaulay, but that he was also acquainted with the critical essays of Wordsworth, Hazlitt, Lamb, Leigh Hunt, and Christopher North.

6. That his acquaintance with English and American history was even less extensive, and that he had also but an imperfect acquaintance with the works of English philosophers and scientists.

7. That among the foreign literatures his acquaintance was closest and most extensive with the French, but that he had also some acquaintance with the chief Greek and Latin writers, with Dante, and with Cervantes, and with the German school of transcendental philosophers.

8. That much of his reading was professional in nature, being prompted by the exigencies of his situation as editor and book-reviewer and concocter of stories, and that he accordingly came to establish a fairly close acquaintance with a good many writers who were of small importance.